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Welcome to Edubuntu 12.04 LTS!

After 6 months of preparation, it's with great pride that the Edubuntu development team announces today the release of Edubuntu 12.04 LTS.

As the first Long Term Support release of the Edubuntu project, this version will be supported for 5 years (April 2017). The Edubuntu development team will also provide "point releases" in sync with Ubuntu's to offer you new installation medias containing all the latest bugfixes.

Further Information

About Edubuntu

The Edubuntu project aims to maintain high quality educational and related packages in Ubuntu. Additionally, we also produce the Edubuntu DVD, which aims to be an easy to use Ubuntu system designed for home and classroom use.

Call for Translations

We're now just 3 weeks away from the final release of Ubuntu 12.04 LTS
(and its flavours).
Ensuring our installation experience and default desktop is as well
translated as possible is one of Edubuntu's goal for this release.

We're almost there and it already looks great compared to our previous
releases, yet I'm sure we can have it even better.

Edubuntu version 12.04 Beta 2 is now released. This beta release is a pre-release version released for testing purposes and shouldn't be used in production.

Here are a few highlights since the last release:

This beta fixes a few issues that were identified in the previous beta release, including improved translations, a new Epoptes release and a new LTSP.

Edubuntu 12.04 will be the first 5 year LTS release of the Edubuntu project.

For this release we focused on quality and stability and refrained from any significant feature improvements.

iTalc, our classroom management tool has been replaced by Epoptes, which is more stable and better integrated with Edubuntu and LTSP.

LTSP is updated to the new major 5.3 release, fixing many bugs, improving performance, bandwidth usage and providing better fat client support.

Freemind and Geogebra were dropped from the default Edubuntu installation in an effort to avoid Java on our DVD. Both of these are still available via the Software Center, but aren't covered by the LTS support term.

The KDE version of edubuntu-desktop will only be supported on a best effort basis and isn't covered by the LTS support term either.

Edubuntu now includes vim and pastebinit by default to make the command line experience of advanced users more pleasant.

The full technical overview for this beta release is available on the Ubuntu wiki. Be sure to read the Ubuntu parts too, since it also impacts Edubuntu.

Anki Tutorial

One of the things we'd like to do in Edubuntu in 2012 is showcase more of the software that we ship and tell stories of people who use it.

We stumbled upon a great write-up of Anki, a flashcard reader program installed in Edubuntu and otherwise available via Ubuntu Software Center.

Here's a snippet:

"Prepping for a Linux certification exam? Helping the kids with schoolwork? No matter what the subject is, Anki can help you commit it to memory. The flexible open source study system is based around the flashcard concept, but with support for audio, video, and more, and the program can adapt to your learning style."

New developments in LTS

Historically, Edubuntu releases weren't released as long-term support releases with their Ubuntu LTS counterparts. While the Ubuntu LTS release was supported for 3 years on the desktop and 5 years on the server, the Edubuntu release was supported for the standard 18 months.

Ubuntu 12.04 takes a huge leap forward by not only supporting the server for 5 years, but also the desktop install. Derivatives can also separately apply for LTS status.

Some necessary changes

The Edubuntu team decided to apply for LTS status for 12.04, and had to made some changes in order to support Edubuntu 12.04 for such a period. The most notable changes is dropping the Java runtime files from the default installation, since we don't have the capacity to maintain security updates for it for 5 years. This leads to the removal of Freemind, a great mind mapping tool, as well as Geogebra, an algebra tool. The good news is that both packages will still be available a few clicks away in the Ubuntu Software Center.

iTalc is being removed and is replaced with Epoptes, which is actively developed and integrated in Edubuntu.

Better planning and support

Having long-term Edubuntu releases will allow administrators to better plan and co-ordinate software deployments and upgrade. It also allows contributors to better focus backports of packages and encourages developers to focus on the supportability of the product.

Edubuntu will also have point releases for the 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) release. This means that updated installation media will be made available that will include up to date packages for all software shipped. Point releases will be made along with the Ubuntu release schedule.

WebLive Milestone

Yesterday, the Edubuntu WebLive service surpassed it's one hundred thousandth session. We're thrilled that so many people have taken the time to look at Edubuntu and find out just how easy open source software is and that it can be really valuable in an educational setting.

Try it out!

Haven't tried out WebLive yet? Give it a go! WebLive itself is also open source, if you'd like to deploy your own instance, you can find it hosted on Launchpad.net.

As usual, if you want to try it out, but can't wait for your download to finish, try it out online on Edubuntu WebLive!

If you already have an Ubuntu or derivative system installed, you can simply install any additional Edubuntu packages that you would like to use.

Users of Edubuntu 11.04 can also upgrade directly to 11.10, please note that in all cases you'll get Unity as your new interface, you'll need to select Gnome fallback from the login screen after reboot if you want a classic Gnome interface.

Known issues

Unfortunately, due to Gnome upstream transitioning to gsettings and gtk3, we weren't able to include Gnome Nanny, Sabayon and Pessulus in this release.

Our advanced package selection tool may not appear for users installing in some languages, in such case, all the Edubuntu packages will get installed and you'll then need to remove these you don't want after rebooting to your installed system.

When using the Gnome fallback mode, removing a panel will result in a crash message on the first attempt. After that it works fine.

Welcome to Edubuntu 11.04

This version builds on the excellent 10.10 release, making the installation process even more flexible and improves the desktop not only by updating it but also by updating the look&feel and choosing the best available software for each use case.

What's new ?

Here are the major changes and choices we made for this 11.04 release:

Edubuntu 11.04 ships with a classic Ubuntu desktop by default. Unity is available in both its 2D and 3D versions for these who want to test this new user interface as an option in the installer.

Building on the installer improvements done for the 10.10 release, it's now possible to do fine grained package selection so you can install only what you need.

To improve Edubuntu's security, 11.04 also ships with Arkose installed by default. This tool lets you easily run untrusted binaries in a safe environment (sandbox).

New software packages in Edubuntu include Pencil, Geogebra, Calibre, LibreCAD, Freemind and Stellarium.

The default wallpaper and the installation slideshow have been updated.

LTSP now ships with an Edubuntu theme for both the boot splash and the login screen

Thanks to WebLive, you may now try most software available in the Ubuntu Software Center online without having to install them. Simply pick a software and click the "Test drive" button below the screenshot. After a few seconds you'll be testing that software online.

How do I get it ?

If you just want to see what Edubuntu 11.04 looks like, simply go and try it on WebLive.
All you need is a few minutes and a computer with Java installed.

You can install Edubuntu from flash disk or DVD installation media.

If you already have an Ubuntu or derivative system installed, you can simply install any additional Edubuntu packages that you would like to use.

Download

What's new?

This beta release brings no new features, but adds many bug fixes in preperation for the final release.

For more information on this Beta release, including non-Edubuntu specific bugs and features, please refer to the Natty Narwhal Technical Overview wiki page. We strongly recommend reading this, since there are issues which aren't resolved yet and may require workarounds on certain platforms.

The Final release is on 28 April and we hope that you'll be as excited about it as we are!